


Waves come crashing in

by bucxys19



Category: Rise (TV 2018)
Genre: Coming Out, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Internalized Homophobia, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-29
Updated: 2018-04-29
Packaged: 2019-04-29 11:02:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14471265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bucxys19/pseuds/bucxys19
Summary: Simon deals with his feelings for Jeremy and someone who saw them kissing confronts him about it.





	Waves come crashing in

Simon was never going to forget the moment of silence after his mother had demanded a reason for his fathers distaste of the play.  
The moment that had seemed to be stretching out for forever, heavy with meaning.  
Simon hadn't dared to breathe.  
He had known why his father was so against this play.  
All his life, Simon had tried to be a good son. Be a good Christian. Be what his parents wanted.  
They had too much going on in their own lives, caring for his sister, that Simon didn't want to be a burden to them in any way. 

So when Simon sat in his car in front of their house after rehearsal, face burried deep in his hands, he thought back to that moment.  
The look on his father's face.  
Simon couldn't do this to them. He couldn't be this.  
He took a shaky breath, desperately trying to calm down and appear normal before facing his parents. Would they notice? Would his father take one look at him and be able to tell that he had kissed a boy? He had so desperately tried to not think about the way he felt around Jeremy. Tried to push it all away.  
He had made this plan to just avoid Jeremy when they weren't at rehearsal. Minimal interaction. No possibility for anyone to question why they were spending time together and what the nature of their relationship was. No rumours going around that could possibly get to the church community and his parents.  
But then Jeremy had walked up to him and confronted him. Simon had wanted to say no, deny that he felt anything when he was with him. But Simon had hesitated. He couldn't bring himself to say anything. And Jeremy had walked up to him and kissed him. And Simon had thought, "Oh, that's what this is supposed to feel like."  
For a fleeting moment he had let himself forget his surroundings and allowed himself to wonder "what if?". But then he had slipped back into reality and pushed himself away from Jeremy. He quickly had gotten into his car ignoring his shaky legs and took off. 

Simon took a deep breath, or at least tried to, and walked up the driveway. His parents greeted him in the kitchen, asking about his day and seemingly not noticing the storm of emotions that was going through their son's mind. Simon excused himself after dinner and hurried into his room. He burried his head under a pillow and desperately prayed for his brain to stop thinking. 

It was a few days after the cops almost cought the troupe trying to steal the sign at the old steel mill. Simon walked into an empty break room before rehearsal started and sighed in relief.  
He had tried avoiding everyone in their group and instead focused on school which was hard since his mind was still a mess.  
Whenever Annabelle had come up to him in the hallways he had quickly made up an excuse and sent her an apologizing smile.  
But he just couldn't deal with what had happened in the steel mill.  
He had convinced himself that his feelings for Jeremy were just a result of them spending a lot of time together and would go away if he just had another person touch him.  
But as soon as he had layed down next to her and they started kissing he knew he had been wrong. Kissing her felt nothing like his kiss with Jeremy had felt.  
He could tell Annabelle was confused about his behaviour but he just couldn't deal with that right now. He had also definitely been avoiding Jeremy at all cost as he couldn't confront their whole situation just yet. Simon had even been ignoring Lilette which had been especially hard but he knew that she would immediately be able to tell that something was going on with him.  
Thankfully she had a lot going on in her life at the moment as well and hadn't seemed to notice his absence so far. 

It had just been a few minutes before the silence of the empty room was interrupted by footsteps coming down the hallway.  
For a second Simon was worried he would have to have one of the confrontations he had been avoiding but sighed in relief when it was Michael entering the room.  
That feeling didn't last very long as Michael sat down on the couch next to him while giving him a strange look. 

The only times Simon and him had every talked before was inbetween scenes during rehearsal when the crew members would throw a quick "good job" at each other here and there which is why Simon was eyeing him with a questioning look.  
"Hi?", he said with a raised eyebrow.  
"Hey Simon, I wanted to talk to you about something" he replied while shifting uncomfortably in his seat.  
When Simon didn't reply he continued  
"It's just... A few days ago after rehearsal I stayed behind because I wanted to talk to Mr. Mazzu so I left a bit later than the others. I thought all of you had already left, and the others probably did already, but I saw that Jeremy was still there. And he was talking to you. And the thing is I normally wouldn't get involved in any of this, believe me I have better things to do than to get invested into some high school drama but I'm friends with Jeremy and I'm also friends with Annabelle who you're apparently dating and I just don't want either of them getting hurt."  
"Okay?" Simon replied after Michael finished rambling. " I mean, neither do I. I'm not sure why you're telling me all this."  
Michael looked at him with an annoyed look.  
"God, I really have to spell it out to you, don't I. I saw you, Simon. You and Jeremy. In the parking lot. Kissing. Do you get it or do I have to go into even more detail?"

Simon felt the blood in his veins freeze.  
Of course. Of course someone had seen them. It was the schools parking lot for God's sake. Dozens of students had still been on the school grounds.  
He was so stupid.  
Why had he kissed Jeremy back? Why hadn't he just pushed him away to shout at him or something? Why hadn't he made clear that he didn't want any of this, even if it was a lie? 

Simon wanted to explain to Michael that Jeremy had been the one who kissed him. That it was all him. Or that it had been a joke or practise for rehearsal however stupid and unbelievable that sounded. He wanted to tell him that it was Annabelle who he wanted.  
Simon wanted to say something, anything, but no words were able to cross his lips.  
He felt his throat closing up, like something was strangling it.  
The world around him got fuzzy as his eyes filled with tears.  
He tried to take a deep breath, push the tears back into his eyes but his body wouldn't allow it. 

"Simon? Simon, hey! Shit. It's okay! I'm not gonna tell anyone or anything. Believe when I say I know how shitty that is. This is a very personal and difficult process you're going through and you're the one who decides when you have it all figured out and are ready to tell anyone. It's all going to be alright, okay?"  
How could Michael say that everything was going to be okay? Nothing would be okay.  
His parents would find out. They would kick him out and forbit his sister from ever seeing him again.  
His body was shaking as he let out another sob.

"Simon? Oh god Simon, what happened?" he heard Lilette's voice coming from the door.  
Suddenly familiar arms wrapped around him and a new wave of tears crashed over him as he burried his face in her shoulder. He felt fingers combing through his hair and felt himself calm down a bit.  
He distantly heard Lilette ask Michael what had happened but the boy just replied it's not his story to tell and left them to it. Simon felt a tiny glimmer of relief that Michael seemed to be a man of his word and wouldn't tell anyone. 

"Come on, let's get out of here" Lilette said.  
"But what about rehearsal?" he answered with a hoarse voice.  
Lilette had never voluntearely skipped anything in her life, yet alone something she loved doing so much. He lifted his face to look up to her only to see a slightly amused expression on her face.  
"Simon there are more important things than rehearsal right now."  
She pulled him up with her when she got up from the couch and quickly ushered him out of the room before any other troup members could see them.

After they got into her car and she started driving he opened his window and closed his eyes.  
Lilette seemed to give him a moment to collect himself, aimlessly driving around their town with no destination, but after a while she couldn't seem to stand it anymore.  
"Do you wanna talk about it?" she asked while keeping her eyes on the road.  
"Not really" he answered in a flat voice.  
"Simon" she sighed.  
He let out a breath and opened his eyes.  
Lilette had been his best friends since he could remember. She was the most open minded and loving person he had ever met. It shouldn't be this hard to talk to her about this, so why was it?  
He looked at her out of the corner of his eye but she was still just looking at the road. He supposed that would make it a little easier at least.

"The thing is....", he started having no idea where he should even begin.  
"I think I might have feelings for someone" he finally said.  
"Oh? You mean Annabelle?"  
The sinking feeling in his stomach got heavier but he still answered.  
"No. Not Annabelle."  
"Who do you like then?" she asked, not even mentioning the fact that Simon had told her how much he liked Annabel just a couple of days back.  
"It's uhm..." he looked down at his shaking hands.  
"It's Jeremy"  
"Oh. Oh okay. That makes sense I suppose. I mean you have been pretty weird around him recently."  
Simon wasn't sure what reaction he had been expecting but it certainly hadn't been this.  
"You think it makes sense?"  
"Yeah I guess. I think he likes you too."  
"We kissed" he blurted out and immediately felt himself blush and quickly turned his face back to the window.  
"He, um. He kissed me a few days ago. On the parking lot."  
That finally got him a slightly stronger reaction from Lilette.  
"You guys kissed? Unrelated to Spring Awakening?"  
She looked at him with wide eyes. He nodded slightly while blushing even more.  
"Huh. You're handling this pretty well then. I would've expected you to be totally freaking out."  
"Lilette, you literally just walked in on me having a panic attack in a school break room."  
"Yeah but at least you didn't run away to become a nun or something" she laughed and even Simon snorted slightly at that image.  
"But speaking of earlier... what happened? What does Michael have to do with this?"  
Simon stopped smiling and turned his gaze back to his hands in his lap.  
"He saw us. In the parking lot. I mean he said he wouldn't tell anyone and I believe him but I guess I just freaked out about the idea of someone else knowing. He said he didn't want me to hurt Annabelle."  
"Oh shit, Annabelle. I almost forgot about that thing you two had going on. But you ended that after you realized you liked Jeremy, right? Wait. Simon, did you try and sleep with Annabelle before or after Jeremy and you kissed?"  
"After" he said in a guilty voice.  
Lilette gasped and punched him in the arm.  
"Au. Okay I deserved that."  
"Damn right you do. You have to talk to her. And Jeremy too probably. I know how uncomunicative you are. The poor boy probably has no idea what's going on."  
He sighed and nodded defeated. After a few moments of silence he said "Thank you, Lilette."  
"For what?"  
"For talking with me about it I guess? For not hating and rejecting me?"  
"Simon you know I would never do that"  
"You're the only one then" he mumbled.  
She gave him a sad look but didn't say anything more. She knew what his family was like.  
"How about we go over to my place and watch some movies?" she said finally.  
Simon felt a small thankful smile tugging on his lips and he replied "Sounds good. But I get to choose the first one."  
"Simon, no offence but I'm not watching The Prince of Egypt again."

**Author's Note:**

> i mean It's realistic that someone could've seen them right??  
> if u read this and asked urself why does this girl keep jumping in time and use complicated past tenses and shit the answer is /i dont know/


End file.
